Wednesday, September 12, 2012

‘Innocence of Muslims’ film inflames Islamist paranoia

The US film Innocence of Muslims ought to be banned. Not because it mocks Islam and insults Mohammed, but because it looks absolutely dire. The reported budget was $5m, but His Grace could have made it for a fiver: the acting is sub-Neighbours; the screenplay crass and amateurish. It has all the appearance of a Monty Python sketch, minus the brilliant satire and comedic genius of true creative artistry.

As a result of this film, the US consulate in Libya has been attacked with rocket-propelled grenades, and one American has been killed. Some 2000 protestors have also breached the walls of the US Embassy in Cairo, burning the American flag and replacing it with a black banner emblazoned with the Shahada: ‘There is no God but God and Mohammed is His Messenger.’

Yes, yes, we've head it all before. His Grace hasn’t seen the film (and wouldn’t waste his time): it reportedly offends not only because it dares merely to portray Mohammed, but because that portrayal is one of a homosexual son of dubious parentage, who rises to advocate child slavery, extramarital sex, warmongering and summary massacre, all in the name of religion. The message of the film is, quite simply, that this ‘prophet’ is a fraud, a bastard, a rapist and a child molester.

Well, that’s not very nice, is it? The film’s writer, director and producer is one Sam Bacile. He wanted to showcase his view of Islam as a hateful religion. "Islam is a cancer," he said. “The movie is a political movie. It's not a religious movie.”

Right.

Either the man is being duplicitous and deceitful, or he's just stupid. No-one in America could possibly be so unaware of the likely religious consequences of this particular political polemic, especially since Pastor Terry Jones is involved (he of Qur’an burning fame). They must at least recall how Pope Benedict’s Regensburg lecture was received. If a tedious academic treatise can result in riot, bloodshed and murder, film footage in this video age has the capacity to be positively incendiary. Of course Sam Bacile and Terry Jones know that: it is precisely their intention.

But what troubles His Grace is that this outbreak of violence and irrationality coincides with the decision of Channel 4 not to screen Tom Holland’s programme Islam: The Untold Story.

Mr Holland, the author and presenter of the documentary, has apparently received threats and abusive tweets, and so the spineless C4 have decided that this story of Islam will remain untold. Thus, ever so subtly, are the airwaves of Britain being incrementally subject to Shari’a: Islam may not be critically discussed; its history may not be investigated; its precepts may not be debated. The Prince of the Power of the Air arises to seize his throne. And if the broadcast media are not themselves obligingly self-censoring, they will be threatened into subjection and censorship imposed.

This is scandalous. We live in a society which permits freedom of speech and freedom of expression. And yet a few Islamist threats – credible or not – are deemed sufficient to deprive an entire population of satirical entertainment and legitimate religio-historical inquiry.

The Lord Chamberlain has returned, and he’s a Wahhabi, seeking to agitate, occupy, subjugate, inculcate and deny liberty and justice to all in the new Dar Al-Islam. The blasphemy laws have effectively been recast to protect one god, one faith and one prophet, and the mainstream media are complicit in their supine subjection. This is Islamism: the untold story.

I have watched the YouTube footage and agree this is truly dire, on the level of the anti Salman Rushdie film made after the Satanic verse furore. My guess is than over 100 people will be dead by this time next week, the film is WAY more offensive that the Danish Jergens Post cartoons.

However it should not be banned. If the reaction to this trash causes riots and murder, that will send us a powerful lesson. Do we voluntarily self censor for fear of Muslim reaction? From YG's post it seems the answer is yes.

PS anyone remember how many dead in the Life of Brian, Last Temptation of Christ and Piss Christ riots?

I watched the first episode of Islam: The Untold Story on 4od. I take it they have pulled the rest of the series? If this IS the case then they are cowardly appeasers just like the UK government and to a degree the CofE.

There does seem to be a common thread between Islam and Leftism in that dissenting opinions will not be tolerated. No wonder they get along so well, at the moment. Criticise Islam and you are targeted for violence, criticise Gay marriage and you are a Bigot, criticise profligate spending when when we are hugely in debt and you are a facist.

Latest news there are 4 dead at the US embassy including the ambassadeur.

UK foreign secretary William Haig has condemned this and offered to help Libya, but it seems we helped them enough already by taking sides in a civil was using NATO air power to help the Salafist rebels oust Gaddafi and establish an the Islamic theocracy.

Radical muslims tend to kill anyone handy, especially westerners, when their religion is criticised. Apparently Islam is so fragile it will crack under the tiniest slight so they turn to arson and murder to cleanse the insult. And then they wonder why we think they are barbaric.

"We never pay any-one Dane-geld, No matter how trifling the cost;For the end of that game is oppression and shame, And the nation that pays it is lost!"

C4 are effectively paying Dane-Geld to militant Islamists and thereby reducing our ancient freedoms. They should be ashamed. I await with interest, but little positive expectation of an uncompromising statement, a statement from HMG.

@Maturecheese - I saw the Untold Story and I think it was just a 1 episode thing, about 90 mins long.

The saddest thing about this is that I reckon the maker of the film will be slapping himself on the back in congratulatory fashion as he will deem this response to vindicate his film. It is particularly sad, given the "Christian" influence in the creation of it.

And the there are 2 highly ironic things that will Coe from this:1 - Muslims have cried out against a film that has suggested their faith is hate-filled by acting out of hate.2 - The political West will all declare that these actions are not of a faith but by radicals claiming to represent Islam, even though the same Western politicians have spoken about the positive nature of the intervention in Libya and how it was full of a people who wanted to worship Allah in freedom and peace.To both I say this:What a load of b******s!

It's simply outrageous that people who had nothing to do with this tasteless film are being killed for its existence. It shows both how stupid some westerners are and how institutionally violent Islam is. Islam needs to be shown up for what it is - a man made religion with no power to deliver on its promises. But a tasteless film only closes debate and fans the flames of violence.

People are afraid of Islam – or, more correctly, people are afraid of Muslims. They are afraid of violence if they speak out of turn and give offence. Not violence in some remote part of the world, but violence here. And not the random violence of a bombing or sporadic shooting, but personal and directed violence levelled against individuals who fall foul of Islam's blasphemy laws and are effectively declared international outlaws.

This fear, which cannot rationally be dismissed as unreasonable (because it is all too real and present), is why innocuous television programmes are pulled, the media is cowed, and misinformation and silence are accepted as normal in our non-discussion of Islam.

The problem seems unsolvable because there is no presiding authority in Islam, as, for example, there is in Catholicism, which is not to say that Catholics are in the habit of obeying the Magisterium, but at least there can be a definitive ruling which puts certain activities and beliefs entirely in the wrong (the 'nuns on a bus' come to mind).

Christians find the situation particularly galling because they are used to being at the sharp end of blasphemy (which no longer seems to exist in law), often levelled against them by the same people who have wholeheartedly endorsed and supported other religions in the name of culturally plurality.

For Christians then, there is an odd sense of double persecution – from liberals, who attack Christianity without toleration and restraint, whilst at the same time supporting (if only through silence and fear) the followers of a religion that, when it has the whip-hand, shows absolutely no tolerance to either Christians or liberals.

Here, we threaten with prosecution those who might question the 'redefinition of marriage', make social pariahs out of those who dare to question the sacred cow of abortion, and deliberately fabricate and exaggerate the history and beliefs of Christianity (has anyone not heard the grossly overrated Dawkins prattling on about the Real Presence – firing shots that a child armed with a penny catechism could deflect) – and we do this with a sense of impunity. It is a perverse thing to so witness a culture (our culture) at war with itself and its past and so defenceless, so weak.

I don't believe in conspiracy theories – an imaginary coalition in which liberalism and Islam have somehow joined forces to erase Christianity (no one is that organised) – but there does seem to be a coalition of hostile beliefs at work, the consequences of which are predictably disastrous and, it appears, inevitable.

Totally agree C4 and HMG need to grow a backbone. Those making threats should be tracked down and dealt with. The softly softly approach clearly didn't work with those thretening Salman Rushdie and it will not work now.

I recommend Christopher Hitchens essay on how Jefferson dealy with such blackmail

I was enjoying that program “Islam: The Untold Story” I feel deprived of culture now. What a bunch of softies they are at Ch 4. Why can't hey stand up to these bullying muslims and inform them that it's our country, that we don't want to become muslims, but unlike a lot of them we enjoy learning about other cultures' history. we can air what we like on our TV channels. If they don't like it, they can leave. For those who bully from afar, they have no right to dictate what we can and cannot watch in our own country. If they think what Tom Holland is saying is incorrect why don't they intellectually challenge it instead of just hissing a load of hate. I agree with Inspector flame thrower next time.

sam bacile should be arrested under the terrorism act for Inciting Terrorism! He knew the consequences of production of such a film. He hould be tried under US law for Hate crimes too! He probably knew that he would get away with it as so many have done so in the pass. It seems strange that one cannot say jack against jews or deny the holocaust cos they would be hounded and have to pay a heavy price for such remarks and be called ANTI SEMETIC! Why is everyone still asleep? Wake up for God's sake!

The truth does not come to one. The truth needs to be sought for. The danger is to stay prisoner of one's ignorance, fearing to know the other. The danger is to await an ignorant to come and provide information that is not only wrong, but result only in provocation of the other, for the sake of fame and under the slogan of freedom of expression.

I do invite you to investigate about the teachings of Islam with open minds and open hearts, and only then you ll realize the beauty of its divine message, and perhaps you will be one of the many and many that are converting to this great religion: great not because of its followers but because it's God's universal message to the entire humanity and all races!

muslim fellow. We see the ‘beauty of its divine message’ all the time on TV here in the west. If we get to the ‘universal message to the entire humanity and all races!’ in time, we are able to defuse them. When we don’t, we chalk a few more up for your god of hate...

Oh dear, one expects you’ll feel like beheading the Inspector General now...{COUGHS}

You said it loud and clear. It seems that your main teacher of Islam is your TV. My message was get out of that box and seek for knowledge from its right sources. You ll be then able to get it as many did before you.

Last but not least, I have no interest in "beheading" you or whatsoever. However, I do pray God to guide you to the right path if you are sincerely wishing for it!

SHAME! SHAME! SHAME! on this web site for making any excuse for Muslim mobs attacking the USA Embassy in Lybia and killing the ambassador and stringing him and three other innocent people up like animals in a slaughterhouse!

Please post the photos of the American Ambassadors bloody body hanging like a carcass of beef while the Muslims mobs mock him and scream "Allah Akbar" then tell Americans here and the world that "Allah works in mysterious ways".

This is the REAL "Arab Spring" that was taking place last year when all the naive Western liberals promised us that the Middle East was going to become a series of democracies like Western Europe.

Muslim Brotherhood rioters attacked the USA Embassy in Cairo over the weekend. Was this unknown movie responsible for those riots when Muslim Brotherhood mobs burned the American flag and screamed "Allah Akbar"?

What is the excuse for Muslims once again attacking the Copric Christians in Egypt after the "Arab Spring"? This movie?

Five million $$ to make a movie today is the lowest cost film budget immiginable. Was it filmed in someone's backyard in Phoenix, Arinona?

Muslims riot when a cartoon appears in a Danish newspaper, they riot over the Dutch politician geert Wilders 5 minute film about the brutality of uislam in it's own words in the Koran, the Hadiths, and in the words of mullahs and imams and menebers of the Muslim Broitherhood today.

We musn't "offend" Muslims or they will riot and kill.

TO blame this unbelievable act of barbarity on an obscure film is to give support and appease the thugs who did this act.

A nations embassy is sovereign territory. An attack on an emvassy is attacking the nation it represents.

Wait till they start attacking british Embassies and other nations and what will the excuse be?

To make excuses for Muslim animals dragging an ambassadors body from his embassy and killing him and other innocent staff the day after the Muslim brotherhood attack on the USA on September 11, 2001 is dispicable.

"The danger is to await an ignorant to come and provide information that is not only wrong, but result only in provocation of the other, for the sake of fame and under the slogan of freedom of expression."

I'm afraid this is my view about the views of many proponents of many religions - and I daresay they would say similar about my more secular/agnostic viewpoint. The differences are that I don't think freedom of expression is just a slogan and I would never seek to justify physical violence against those with whom I disagree.

I appreciate that it has taken two thousand years to get most Christians to realise that freedom of speech for all is one of the best defences for their own freedom of speech and that many Moslems have already grasped the point, sadly it appears there is still some way to go.

Well, the actions of the extremests are deeply condemned and I, a Muslim, wants them to be executed. However, this "Freedom of Speech" needs to be re-examined; I think that no documentary examining the Holocaust would be allowed in any western country even if it was examining the case in a factual manner. Whenever President Najad, however you think of him, touches on the subject, western Presidents leave the room immediately. I pray for every victim in the embassy in Libya, and that their suffering to bring justice.

Please don't forget Muslims in Cairo attacked the USA Embassy there a few days ago and screamed "Allah Akbar" too. They rioted and had the usual flag burning. You and I know the Muslim Brotherhood is behind this and they are preparing to take over Egypt (already have) and the entire Middle East.

This is the groundwork for the coming Caliphate ( Muslim Empire) and Iran is behind the Muslim Brotherhood financially and "morally".

Since the whole discussion is about Islam, I would have appreciated more a question such as "what does Islam say about the killing of the ambassador? or "what would the Prophet Mohammed, peace be upon him and all other prophets, say about his killings?"

Your question infers that you are looking at negative things rather than seeking for positives!

Anyway, my answer to your question is the following:

- I condemn the killing of anybody by anybody. Life is given by God and no body has the authority to take it from anybody!

- Libya is not my country and I have lots of sympathy to its people for what they have gone through.

- The country is still not politically stable nor is it safe. There are many killings happening out there as the pro-old regime are still fighting. We do not hear about these incidents in the news because they would not generate interest!

- Some rumors say that pro old regime militants are behind the killing of the ambassador to embarrass the current government in front of its allies, USA and Europe. If that is true, reading this blog and browsing around, I have a feeling that the objective has been somehow achieved.

- There are fanatics everywhere and among followers of all religions. Why do we have to focus on only the deeds of those fanatics? Why cant we grow up and positively look at the vast majority of all followers of religions which is good?! These questions actually remind me of the film of Michael Moore, Bowling for Columbine, where he asked a TV producer why the focus is mostly on crimes committed by African Americans although there are also white criminals. The answer of the TV producer was simply because news or TV shows about crimes made by white people would not interest Commercials!

Although I have more arguments, I guess I get to stop here ...

Now for those defending this very low quality film under the pretext of "freedom of expression", you are actually harming the concept more than promoting it.

I do strongly believe in freedom of expression but I do believe stronger "respect of others".

I am free to make an idiot of myself, but I am NOT allowed to make an idiot of others.

I am free to insult myself, but I am NOT allowed to insult the other.

My freedom is limited to the freedom of others. Only when one can realize that and reflect it in his/her life, then he/she can claim being civilized!

Innocent muslim. Your question infers that you are looking at negative things rather than seeking for positives!

Yes, you’ll find that. Must be the killing of a good innocent man and three of his colleagues that is causing a bit of uncharacteristic negativity.

Actually, today’s post in this man’s opinion is about freedom of speech. Personally speaking, the unwarranted insulting of Islam is sheer bad manners. There is plenty of criticising of Islam due, but to actually go out with the intention of causing shock and outrage is just not on. It’s bad form. The producers of the muck involved have already been condemned. But killing anyone for it ?

One has noticed in the past that after each atrocity, the ‘peace’ of Islam is run up the flag for all to salute. This occasion included...

1 hr 37 min 11 sec Swiss says he is not worried about a paranormal event happening. Little does he know what is actually taking place

1 hr 39 min 50 sec The mocking of SPIRITS!

1 hr 40 min 27 sec Reference made to the TERROR of witnessing a supernatural event, i.e, the blood leaving the face

1 hr 41 min 15 sec Reference to "these people"

1 hr 41 min 40 sec Belief in the supernatural is claimed to be a psychological defence mechanism to cope with reality. Swiss talks about how desperate the psychics become when debunked. Little does he know what is happening to the skeptics!

1 hr 42 min 11 sec WHEN PROPHECY SUCCEEDS! KABOOM

___________

youtube.com/watch?v=gHbYJfwFgOU

which WORLD-VIEW will not exist, sh*thead?

______________

5000 whining atheists vs the Great Prophet

how the divine pen of Michel N. crushed the international atheist movement

Let's not forget that the first international crisus the USA faced was the issue of the Barbary Pirates in the early 1800's. These Muslim pirates from what is now Algeria, Morocco, Tunesia, and Lybia raided ships to and from North and South America from the early 1500's to the late 1700's capturing European slaves and sending them to North Africa. These Muslims made slave raids went as far north as Ireland and Scotland. The raided the coasts of Fraance, Spain, Italy, Sicily, etc.

President Jefferson sent the USA Marines to Tripoli (how ironic considering todays awful news from that city) to put a stop to Muslim slave trade of Europeans going to the USA in 1805. Lookup the Barbary Wars.The USA Marines beat these Muslims and for the first time the USA was planted on foreign soil in 1805. The line in the USA Marines Battle Hymn: "to the shores of Tripoli..." is from this 1805 victory of the USA Marines over the Barbary Pirate Muslims. The USA fought another war with the Barbary Muslims in 1815.

Jefferson asked that a Koran be sent from England that was translated into English so he could understand the mentality of Islam. He was definately not impressed with what he read.

This Koran is used by stupid American Muslims as their fantasy that Jefferson was interested in Islam. Obama uses it at the Eid feast to mark the end of Ramadan each year saying the lie that Jefferson held such a feast at the White House. A total lie.

I am waiting to see what this total incompetent in the White House does in reaction to this act of war by Muslims in Tunesia.

Do you remember Obama's trip abroad soon after he was sworn in as President? He went to Cairo, Egypt and spoke at a university there and praised Islam, told us how peaceful it was and all the wonderful things it inspired and what brilliant civilizations it had created, etc, ec, etc, lie after lie after lie.

President Obama has shown absolutely no leadership during the past nearly four years, he has contempt for his own military and country, let's see how this incompetent handles this major crisus.

Ambassador J Christopher Stevens reportedly died of smoke inhalation after a crowd stormed the consulate.So sayeth the BBC and do not mention anything about what happened to his body.Reading some of the posts it seems there is a widespread delusion that Islam is strong in Islamic lands. This is nonsense. There is widespread conversion to Christianity in France - about 10 thousand a year to Catholicism and about 5000 to Protestantism. In Afghanistan there is also growing conversion to Christianity. In Egypt the conversion has reached several million. All this in the face of at best ostracism and the much more likely death and torture. There are even secret organisations set up to protect these converters.Millions world wide have converted. The only way Moslems can counter this trend is to have an extremely high birth rate. But they have problem with the young who resent the restrictiveness of Islam and when the world is not so reliant on oil... What we are seeing is the last desperate throes of a tyrant. They know the window of opportunity for Sharia worldwide must be seized now or it will too late.Let us never forget the Armenian Christians massacred by the Moslem Turks not to mention the Greek Orthodox killings and five centuries of Serbian oppression by the Muslims. And the British Government is falling over itself to bring the Turks into the EU. Shame!

Christopher Stevens, the US ambassador to Libya murdered earlier today was a martyr to Zionist attempts to draw the US into war with Iran.

The attack on the US consulate in Benghazi was prompted by an insulting film made by Zionist Jews that depict the prophet Mohammed, and Muslims in general, as killers and perverts.

This is taking place as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is ratcheting up pressure on the US to attack Iran, or to support an Israeli attack.

Christopher Steven's fate is an object lesson for all Americans. Zionists are happy to see Americans die fulfilling Zionist goals. On Monday, we commemorated the 11th anniversary of the false flag attack on the World Trade Center, which has Zionist fingerprints all over it.

If Obama is indeed resisting Zionist pressure, I say "Bravo." Zionism is a pernicious force which has less to do with a Jewish homeland than with Sabbatean Jewish (Illuminati) world domination.

By what logic should Israel or Pakistan have nuclear weapons but not Iran?

Israel has sufficient deterrent to ensure Iran would never use them. No, the real objection is that they prevent Zionist conquest, for which they are a pretext, as in the case of Iraq.

The film which provoked Muslim outrage is a gratuitous hate crime but since Jews define "hate" (as anything they hate,) the director Sam Bacile, 56, has not been charged. Nor have the more than 100 Jewish donors who financed the $5 million effort.

Bacile, a California real estate developer who identifies himself as an Israeli Jew, said he believes the movie will help his native land by exposing Islam's flaws to the world.

"Islam is a cancer, period," he said repeatedly.

"The two-hour movie, "Innocence of Muslims," the film claims Muhammad was a fraud. An English-language 13-minute trailer on YouTube shows an amateur cast performing a wooden dialogue of insults disguised as revelations about Muhammad, whose obedient followers are presented as a cadre of goons.

"It depicts Muhammad as a feckless philanderer who approved of child sexual abuse, among other overtly insulting claims that have caused outrage.

The film is obscene and portrays Mohammed as a bastard who performs lewd acts. It portrays atrocities by Muslims against Christians which the Muslim authorities condone and blame on Christians. This is ironic since Zionists are inciting attacks against Americans and blaming Muslims.

Christopher Stevens was not the first, and will not be the last American to die because of US refusal to resist Zionist ambition, which ultimately is to enslave them.

The mental and spiritual phase of this enslavement has largely taken place.

Your freedom of speech is not limited whatsoever - what is limited is your freedom to undertake violence against others or to encourage others to undertake such violence. If you want to make a film/speech criticising what is said in the rather stupid US film please feel free to do so subject to the usual laws of libel.

Freedom of speech subject to not respecting/offending/insulting someone is not freedom of speech at all - I suspect that neither you or I are capable of speaking without someone/somewhere being upset by what we might say. What you are really saying is that your beliefs are inherently superior and therefore beyond criticism and probably that you don't know how to handle such criticism.

I was primarily referring to the likes of Omar's comments, but I did notice your post. I think that the actions of the Israeli MP and the actions of the group who trashed the Monastery were quickly condemned by Israeli civil society as one would expect, rather than excuses being made etc.

In 2005 the number one best seller in Turkey was Hitler's "Mein Kampf" (My Struggle). I am not joking. Look it up. This book has been a popular best seller in Turkey (and other Muslim countries too), off and on, since the mid 1990's. Turkey is a NATO country and a possible future member of the EU with it's 80 million Muslims having the "right" to emigrate to any country in the EU they choose.

Of course Turkey also borders other Muslim countries to the east and south making numbers of illegal Muslim emigrants crossing Turkey into Europe endless.

That's the idea from a Jihadist point of view and their dream.

A stealth Islamic invasion of Europe with the welcome mat of endless welfare state goodies offered by the stupid European dhimmi's.

The Crusade complex continues in the West.The West, whether Christian or dechristianised, has never really known Islam. Ever since they watched it appear on the world stage, Christians never ceased to insult and slander it in order to find justification for waging war on it. It has been subjected to grotesque distortions the traces of which still endure in the European mind. Even today there are many Westerners for whom Islam can be reduced to three ideas: fanaticism, fatalism and polygamy. Of course, there does exist a more cultivated public whose ideas about Islam are less deformed; there are still precious few who know that the word Islam signifies nothing other than 'submission to God'. One symptom of this ignorance is the fact that in the imagination of most Europeans, Allah refers to the divinity of the Muslims, not the God of the Christians and Jews; they are all surprised to hear, when one takes the trouble to explain things to them, that 'Allah' means 'God', and that even Arab Christians know him by no other name. Islam has of course been the object of studies by Western orientalists who, over the last two centuries, have published an extensive learned literature on the subject. Nevertheless, however worthy their labours may have been , particularly in the historical and and philological fields, they have contributed little to a better understanding of the Muslim religion in the Christian or post-Christian milieu, simply because they have failed to arouse much interest outside their specialised academic circles. One is forced also to concede that Oriental studies in the West have not always been inspired by the purest spirit of scholarly impartiality, and it is hard to deny that some Islamicists and Arabists have worked with the clear intention of belittling Islam and its adherents. This tendency was particularly marked for obvious reasons in the heyday of the colonial empires, but it would be an exaggeration to claim that it has vanished without trace.

Mr Omar Hussein @ 23.41 says, 'Christians never ceased to insult and slander it in order to find justification for waging war on it.'

So the Muslim invasion of the Byzantine lands in the Levant and North Africa, the destruction of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, the conquest of most of the Iberian peninsular, the invasion of southern France, the invasion of Anatolia, the Fall of Constantinople, the invasion of the Danube basin, the sieges of Vienna, the siege of Malta etcetera, etcetera, all mere figments of the Crusader imagination?

When one mentions Islam to the materialist atheist, he smiles with a complacency that is only equal to his ignorance of the subject. In common with the majority of Western intellectuals, of whatever religious persuasion, he has an impressive collection of false notions about Islam. One must, on this point, allow him one or two excuses. Firstly, apart from the newly-adopted attitudes prevailing among the highest Catholic authorities, Islam has always been subject Fin the West to a so-called 'secular slander'. Anyone in the West who has acquired a deep knowledge of Islam knows just to what extent its history, dogma and aims have been distorted. One must also take into account that fact that documents published in European languages on this subject (leaving aside highly specialised studies) do not make the work of a person willing to learn any easier.

As is the case with many things, being aware of the problem is half the battle. Once a sincere seeker of the Truth is aware of the long standing misunderstanding and hostility between Islam and the West and learns not to trust everything which they see in print authentic knowledge and information can be gained much more quickly. Certainly, not all Western writings on Islam have the same degree of bias they run the range from willful distortion to simple ignorance and there are even a few that could be classified as sincere efforts by non-Muslims to portray Islam in a positive light. However, even most of these works are plagued by seemingly unintentional errors, however minor, due to the author's lack of Islamic knowledge. In the spirit of fairness, it should be said that even some contemporary books on Islam by Muslim authors suffer from these same shortcomings, usually due to a lack of knowledge, heretical ideas and or depending on non-Muslim sources.

This having been said, it should come as no surprise that learning about Islam in the West especially when relying on works in European languages has never been an easy task. Just a couple of decades ago, an English speaking person who was interested in Islam, and wishing to limit their reading to works by Muslim authors, might have been limited to reading a translation of the Qur'an, a few translated hadeeth books and a few dozen pamphlet-sized essays. However, in the past several years the widespread availability of Islamic books written by believing and committed Muslims and the advent of the Internet have made obtaining authentic information on almost any aspect of Islam much easier. Today, hardly a week goes by that a new English translation of a classic Islamic work is not announced. Keeping this in mind, I would encourage the reader to consult books written by Muslim authors when trying to learn about Islam. There are a wide range of Islamic book distributors that can be contacted through the Internet.

Cut the long and boring defense of the Koran crap and the "we Muslims are so abused" act and pack of lies and have the decency to condemn these animals and what they did to the American consulate director and three others in Tripoli:

The cold blooded murder of innocent people and the desecration of the body of the consulate director by a mob of thugs in the name of their pagan moon god evil nasty cult.

BLUEDOG

Exactly. The Eastern Christian Roman Empire Byzantium) with it's capital at Constantinople was the preserver of classical Greek and Roman Culture as well as the creators of beautiful art and architecture to praise Christ and His Church for over 1,000 years before these Jihadist Muslim thugs finally destroyed the Byzantine Empire and Constantinople in 1453.

Past Islamic Caliphates existed over vast distances and included many sects of Islam. Their differences were and can be forgotten for the common goal which was (and is) to recreate a modern Jihad within a new Caliphate centered in Baghdad. Then they can carry out their 1,400 year old dream to kill or convert all Jews and Christians and other infidels to Islam and unite the world to live under Islamic law of Sharia.That's exactly what the Hitler's wearing turbins in Iran are planning. They are insane and they might have nukes.

How does that grab you? The thought of it bites me!

This is the goal of the Muslim Brotherhood founded in Egypt in the late 1920's. Read what they said back then and still say and do. 911 was an example of their planning. Nothing has changed in the past 1,400 years since Moahmmed lived.

Only today we welcome them into our countries to make plans in their mosques to destroy us.

Decision motivated by alleged irregularities in the building permit. The faithful respond: the documents are legal, the town council refuses to grant the permit. And promise to go ahead with regular Sunday services. For some time the area has been the scene of violence and abuse against minorities, especially Christians.

Jakarta (AsiaNews) - With the pretext of irregularities in building permits, public safety officials (the Satpol PP) in Bogor, West Java province, yesterday sealed off a "house of prayer" used by over 6 thousand Catholics from the parish of St. John the Baptist. For six years, the faithful have regularly used the building for weekend liturgies and those of the main Christian festivals, but had recently come under fire from authorities - three times - ordering them to stop all worship. The Catholic community has deliberately ignored the warnings, believing the closure order related IMB specious and counting on the legitimate right to religious freedom.

The process for building a church in Indonesia - Catholic or Protestant - is quite complicated and may take five to ten years to obtain all permits required by law. The procedure is governed by the Izin Mendirikan Bangunan (IMB), a species of written protocol that allows for construction to commence and is issued by local authorities. The story gets more complicated if it is a place of Christian worship: permission must be obtained from a number of residents in the area where the building is to be constructed and the local Group for Interfaith Dialogue. And even if the permission is granted "unspecified reasons" can come into play that will lead officials to block the projects. Often, this occurs after pressure from the Muslim community or radical Islamic movements.

Imagine if new Muslims in Europe or the USA, Canada, or Australia faced these same types of restrictions wanting to build mosques.

Thank you for your well informed post. Especially your mention of the Eastern Orthodox Christian Armenians and Serbs. The persecution and mass murder by Muslims in the last century they endured was and still is unbelievable.

Everyone should view the Youtube videos of Muslim mobs burning ancient Serbian Orthodox Christian churches and monasteries only a few years ago in Kosovar. The glee had knocking off the crosses from the doems of the churches and the insane riots inside the same chueches tearing down the iconostasis was sad to view...

When even the buddhists in burma want to throw our islam,little more needs to be said,apart from the organised defilement by muslims of English girls in northern England,the targetted rape of the women in the nordic countries,the bombings ,beheadings,olympic massacres,hi-jackings,and the taquia in the above comments which can only be delusional considering events in the real world,live in the sixth century if you will but do not expect us to.

O.K I can understand that there are many people who sincerely follow a belief system different to mine, & I have enjoyed discussion & debate with them. They have a right to choose & follow any cult or religion that they want.They are free to change from unbelief to belief, or from one belief to another. Without threat or harassment from their former fellows, (apart from being barred from attending or speaking with others who still hold to their former beliefs).The events in Libya were not the work of a handful of fanatics, but an attack by thousands. Murder & mayhem over what? A poorly written & acted B Movie?.I have the right to embrace ANY faith or belief. Do the followers of Islam have the same right? No!, not without being put in fear of their & their families lives.The media only reports a fraction of what occurs to Christian believers & converts in the Muslim World.You can fool some of the people all of the time & all of the people some of the time, but you can't fool all of the people all of the time.I would say if you KNOW you are right, allow your followers the freedom of choice regarding religion.

tory boys: Freedom of speech subject to not respecting/offending/insulting someone is not freedom of speech at all

We clearly disagree on this. Freedom of speech is to be regulated and that is why we have laws in all societies that condemn verbal harassment/assaults and so on. We are not living in the jungle where anyone can insult anybody under the pretext of freedom of speech. If you think otherwise, I invite you to insult an officer/somebody on the street, have that video taped, and ask the guy to sue you. You will then see the consequences!!!

=====David: So, Innocent Muslim, what makes you think that there is a god, then?

This question is orthogonal to the main stream of this blog discussion. But my answer to you is as simple as this.

Believing in God/Allah/Dieu/Dios is called FAITH not science! I feel fortunate to be one of the 21st century's citizens witnessing all the advances that science has achieved and that clearly indicate that the expansion of the universe, the motion of planets, the birth/death cycle of cells in any creature's body, etc all follow a very complicated, yet very accurate calculations and mechanisms. My question then bounces back to you: What makes you think that there is no super power behind all of these calculations?! That super power I refer to as GOD!

For all that are speaking as if Islam was "spread by Sword" from Morocco to Indonesia, this just shows how limited your sources of information are! have a look at this video made by a British historian and see what the Muslims contributed when Europe was living in its dark ages! Muslims made of Spain the number one tourist hub in the world!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PM8HnvuKbAo

For your records, the first that invented and adopted the "rights of minority" are Muslims protecting Jews from Christians! Muslims also welcomed Jews and made them live among them in North Africa when they were kicked out from Europe!

It is very sad noting the ignorance that many of you are really exhibiting. You know few keywords (e.g., caliphate, Muslim brotherhood, etc) and you speculate conclusions based on no foundation, but your ignorance!

"We clearly disagree on this. Freedom of speech is to be regulated and that is why we have laws in all societies that condemn verbal harassment/assaults and so on. We are not living in the jungle where anyone can insult anybody under the pretext of freedom of speech. If you think otherwise, I invite you to insult an officer/somebody on the street, have that video taped, and ask the guy to sue you. You will then see the consequences!!!"

You won't get sued, unless the abuse amounts to persistent harrassment, the person you're insulting is a police officer, or your insult contains words clearly intended to incite violence (such as threatening to cut his head off).

Problem is, it would be nice if we could all avoid insulting each other for the sake of it, but sometimes there are things that people feel obligated to say that are offensive to other people. The minute you start deciding which of those people can silence others by way of feeling offended, you're in a very strange, and very messy situation.

Much better to leave it to common sense. If someone insults you - especially if it's not in the context of the street (where it might descend into a brawl) - insult them back or shun and ignore them. Don't go asking the law to intervene unless you're quite content for it to intervene against you when you offend someone else.

EnglishmanDuring the colonial period numbers of migrants entered Burma from India.In the post independence era they were not recognised as citizens.The Rohingya(Bengalis) have become stateless.Since they were part of the British Empire I would hope Englishmen such as yourself face up to their responsibilities as the former colonial power and grant them British citizenship.

The British Empire crumbled away sixty years ago and the problem is that Britain is in no position to grant anyone citizenship as we are in fact Citizens of the European Union. You see Britain is nothing more than a colony of Brussels, so you'd better ask them, in which case your refugees can go to France or Italy- much nicer climate than our little windswept island, no?.

Might I suggest that you read it, as it offers a very different interpretation of Islamic history than your own? It is not a commentary on religion, but rather an analysis of the work of Belgian historian Henri Pirenne, whose ideas around the causes of the European Dark Ages are gaining currency again. Islam does not come out well in his analysis, which I am sure you will agree does not automatically make him wrong.

I will have a look at the books you mention, though am not a fan of Karen Armstrong – ex-nuns always have a number of axes to grind, it seems.

Might I suggest that you read it, as it offers a very different interpretation of Islamic history than your own? It is not a commentary on religion, but rather an analysis of the work of Belgian historian Henri Pirenne, whose ideas around the causes of the European Dark Ages are gaining currency again. Islam does not come out well in his analysis, which I am sure you will agree does not automatically make him wrong.

I will have a look at the books you mention, though am not a fan of Karen Armstrong – ex-nuns always have a number of axes to grind, it seems.

Of course freedom of speech can be abused and in extremis amount to harassment and we have laws to deal with this. But were you really harassed/assaulted by this silly film and to such an extent that it can justify you in going out (or in your case pointedly failing to condem those who went out) to murder not those who actually made the film but government officials who allowed it to happen because they have a different view as to what amounts to freedom of speech?

Yes we can have a debate about the niceties of what constitutes freedom of speech, but I'm afraid we have to get past the basic concept stage first.

I can happily agree that West/Christianity has a far from spotless record in defending freedom of speech - but you have to understand that having largely won that freedom, we are not about to give it away to those that still feel that their submission to God allows them to get away from the basic responsibility for their own actions.

"My guess is that this is a "Reichstag fire" fire that the Copts are going to bear the blame forand the results of what is unleashed."

I have the same misgivings, Andrei. It's the timing of this that bothers me. The week leading up to the 11th anniversary of 9/11 this film appears. Terry Jones role in this seems to be passing; someone approached him about the film but he did not meet anyone. Sam Bacile sounds such a made up name ( imbecile?) The Copts and the Jews are tied in and the riot at the US embassy happens on September the 11th. Someone is trying to cause trouble; I just can't make up my mind who it is.

You tweeted "But it is amusing that Stephen Sizer finds his Grace's opinion 'the least helpful and most cynical' - a bit like Sizer's own on Israel. "

The BBC is no less helpful or cynical when they state 'The Prophet Mohammed or Mohammed The Prophet' whenever referring to him and Islam in any context but always never state 'Jesus the Christ or The Christ Jesus' likewise...and they wonder why we complain and they call us unfair bigots regarding their unlawful subservience to one alien minority faith over the historic British majority Faith.

I noticed that several of the early reports carried an AFP quote from a rioter in Egypt who made out that the Copts were as angry as the Muslims about the film, and had participated in the Embassy "protest".

Which did make me wonder much the same about what was "going on" so to speak.

Oh goodness, I see we have Lord Lavenden trying to dismiss my concerns as some kind of illusion how silly

The inspector makes a good point that usury may have initially encouraged growth but it also encourages rape and pillage when you cannot pay back

John points to the popularity of Mein Kampf and a future influx of muslims on benefits, forgetting that England will by then have been well and truly raped and pillaged by the bankers, with nothing in the pot we face unrest and war

Manfarang 02:19Absolutely agree Manfarang as I sit and listen to the call to prayer. The five religions live easily heretogether.My Muslim neighbours are very tolerant and relaxed and chat with the Bishop and Vicar General who frequent my home often.Magee gasbagging from his rocking chair in Pittsburgh knows nothing. Asia would be just a dim memory in his decrepit mind of dropping napalm and agent orange on the coolies in the Vietnam war.

Is it by chance or coincidence or was it deliberate planning that these attacks on USA Embassies in Egypt amd Lybia happened on the September 11th?

It is sickening when church leaders and church laymen make excuses for the brutality of Islam.

I hope you remember that day is the anniversary each year when the Muslim Brotherhood hijackers attacked the USA with hijacked jets full of innocent people and rammed them into skyscrapers, into a field in Pennsylvania (a location not far from where I presently live), and into the Pentagon in Washington. Over 3,000 people were killed 11 years ago om September 11, 2001.

This obscure movie was an excuse to carry out a well organized plan to attack the USA Embassy in Cairo and our consulate in Lybia. Al Queda planned this in great detail.

The Muslim brotherhood controls the Egyptian government. Remember the "Arab Spring" last year when the liberal fools in Washington and London and elswhere atcually believed freedom and democracy wer going to burst out all over the Middle East?

The United States Constitution guarantees freedom of speech. For the USA to condemn in anyway the makers of this film mocking Islam and Mohammed is to become full-fledged dhimmi's (servants of Islam) by denying the people of the USA and the makers of this film their Constitutional right of freedom of speech. If any retaliation is taken against the makers of this film by the Obama Justice Department commisars that would be a gross violation of the civil rights of the film makers and I hope people who value civil rights will rush to help them if they are charged with any "crime".

Blame these riots on the Muslim Brotherhood and NOT on the makers of some stupid film made by amateurs and posted on Youtube. if it is so "offensive" to these Muslim idiots why did they watch it?

When al Quaeda made a video of the beheading of the American journalist Daniel Pearl in 2002 I watched it. I saw the man's throat slit and heard his screams and gurgling as the blood filled his throat and then saw his head cut off with a dull knife by these retrograde Muslim savages. It was barbaric and the Muslim world loved it. I wish His Grace would post THAT video here and see the reaction from his readers. Tens of millions of people saw that video in 2002 and we were outraged but we didn't riot and wreck mosques, kill Muslims, or attack the embassies of Muslim countries in Washington and in other countries.

If people want to make a film criticle of any prominet person alive today or from the past, of religion and atheism, or about any political system, their own country or any other country that is their sacred right and freedom to do so by the USA COnstitution. The USA and no other Western nation does NOT have to apologize to Muslism for anything Islam is NOT exempt from criticism , humor. or ridicule. If it is we are doomed and our freedoms are meaningless.

In fact this evil cult begs to be criticized by civilized people for the actions of it's believers over the past 1,400 years based on the violence, hatred, and revenge written in the Koran and the Hadiths.

To blame what these savages did once again shows the liberal naivety which believes if you are nice to the bad guys you will be treated "nice" in return.

No, if you are "nice" to the bad guys and evil doers they will return your kindness and consideration by harming or killing you.

We in the West have turned our cheeks too many times in modern times by liberals in power making excuses for the brutality of Islam.

It's time to kick these savages asses to the moon where their pagan moon god of Medina lives.

The millions of people alive today who fled the Communist takeover of South Viet Nam, Laos, and Cambodia have a different view from your pollyannish view of that era. The millions who died after 1975 at the hands of the Communists aren't here to tell their story.

You have a selective memory. The USA was in Viet Nam with other countries from SEATO (South East Asian Treaty Organization signed in 1954 its members included Australia, France, New Zealand, Pakistan (including East Pakistan, now Bangladesh), the Philippines, Thailand, the United Kingdom, and the United States. The members were anti-communist Western nations who united to stop Communist China and the USSR from expanding their influence in Asia. There were Australian, Filipino, South Koran, and troops from other nations in Viet-nam during that war.

President Kennedy sent the first combat troops to South Viet Nam in March 1961. The day he was assassinated on November 22, 1963 there were over 17,000 troops in South Viet Nam. Twelve years later the USA and SEATO was defeated by the Communists and I that made the left jubilant. Were you happy by that defeat and the misery the people of South Viet nam, Cambodia, and Laos endured?

You forget about the over 3 million refugees who fled on boats and rafts after Viet Nam fell to the People's Army of Liberation in the spring of 1975. At least 500,000 of them drowned or were killed in the South China Sea by the North Vietnamese military. The survivors went to live in the USA and Europe. Oh...I forgot laos and cambodia and the three million people Pol Pot killed in Cambodia after 1975.

Next time you visit Cambodia visit the museums there dedicated to the memory of the millions killed by the Communist thug and mass murderer Pol Pot.

Those muslim types who have contributed to this debate, the Inspector thanks you. He has read everything. What we have from you here is from the heart and not carefully prepared propaganda.

Islam does indeed have a message. It’s leave everything and come with me. Now, the problem here is that in the West, Islam is an alien way of life, and we do recognise that it is much more than a religion, it is a binding creed. So, we greet Islam with as much enthusiasm as you would if Polynesian head hunters turned up at your door and said to you “Leave everything and come with me”

I am not sure why you are addressing your comments to me Did you misread the 2nd sentence as a statement of my views rather than a question/challenge of those of innocent Muslim - if so please understand that in no way do i believ that the the US Constitution is incorrect with regard to defending freedom of speech.

I suspect that you are correct that the aim of these protests was for the Islamofascists to celebrate 9/11 and the film was just the most convenient pretext they could find.

I have no problem in criticising barbarity, those who justify it or those who wish to deny freedom of speech to others on the most flimsy of pretexts whatever their religion or belief - and I don't wish to descend to their level in retaliation. I would also point out that there are Moslems who have no such difficulty whatsover. We didn't beat the German, Spanish and Italian fascists by descending to their level, and we didn't do it by appeasing them or avoding fighting them however - might I suggest the same fro its Islamic version.

I do think you need to be a little careful in lumping everyone in to one monolithic mass of opponents as well - the Muslim Brotherhood has rather mopre diversity than you imagine and as has already been pointed out to you it most definitely isn't in league with Iran.

... after the ambassador of his country's chief ally gets killed in the backlash.

So some Arabs riot and murder in response to a movie and its all the fault of the Israelis.

Gotta love those guys, eh?

Because they obviously should have restrained themselves lest the Muslims in Egypt and Libya riot and murder. We all know that Muslims are by nature murderous and can't help themselves, so they must never ever ever be provoked.

So let's recap. "Angry Muslims kill someone and it's all the fault of the a Jew." What do we call that kind of assertion? Hrmmmmm.

"I suspect that you are correct that the aim of these protests was for the Islamofascists to celebrate 9/11 and the film was just the most convenient pretext they could find."

It may just be a little bit more sinister than that, in fact. The videao clips on YouTube may have been a deliberate provocation.

Information is now emerging over the origins the video. It may have been a deliberate incitement to violence.

But by whom? Israelis, anti-Islamists or Coptic Chtistians?

The video first appeared online on 1 July, posted in English by someone using the name "Sam Bacile." The most offensive comments about Islam and the Prophet Muhammad had been dubbed onto the soundtrack afterwards and not spoken by the actors.

'Sam Bacile' spoke to a number of media outlets on Tuesday, making inflammatory anti-Islamic comments in support of the film. He claimed to be an Israeli-born Jewish estate agent who had raised millions of dollars from Jewish donors to make the film.

Is he a real person? Unlikely. Is he Jewish? Unlikely.

An American called Steve Klein, linked with various anti-Islamic groups in California, promoted the video, but said he did not know the identity of the director. He eventually admitted he thought 'Sam Bacile' was just a pseudonym.

Pastor Terry Jones from Florida, whose anti-Muslim actions have included burning Korans, said he had been in touch with Mr Bacile over promotion of the film, but had not met him and could not identify him.

Another name appeared linked to the film - Morris Sadek - an Egyptian American from the anti-Islamic National American Coptic Assembly. His promotion of the movie brought inquiries into the involvement of Coptic Christian groups.

The Associated Press news agency, followed a trail, after supposedly speaking with 'Sam Bacile', to a Californian called Nakoula Basseley Nakoula, 55, who told AP he was a Coptic Christian and admitted he was involved in logistics and management of the film's production. He denied being the director or posing as Sam Bacile.

The exact origin of the movie, the internet clip, and the motivation behind its production, remains a mystery, but it appears not to be linked to an Israeli film-maker as was earlier widely reported.

It was the film's translation into Arabic and broadcast on Arab TV stations and talk shows which sparked the violence - although investigations are now under way in Washington to establish whether the worst of the violence was not spontaneous. The religious Egyptian TV channel al-Nas showed clips from the video, dubbed into Arabic, and scenes posted online have been viewed hundreds of thousands of times.

David B: "Islam does indeed have a message. It’s leave everything and come with me."

Um, isn't that the same message as Christianity, just a different 'me'?

The difference is the use of the same word.

For example, The word "G_d" leaves an infinite open end, from Alpha to Omega, beginninglessness to endlessness. The word "God" however objectifies and solidifies into a Time-Bound Being making it possible for any mug to kill in God's Name. Yet no one can kill for G_d who has no name.

Marriage is to hold the reproduction of life, to cradle and protect the next generation within a loving home, (even to adopt), and not to bastardize it into the lustful desires of keeping one or more partners subservient for a sense of vain-glorious life, whilst the others receive a self-righteous life of judging the pig.

"this is my body shed..." is a symbolic rememberance of Jesus' gift of sacrificing his life whilst the transmutation into literal blood and guts at a Church Alter is no more than that of Peruvian sacrifices whose blood was drunk and eaten for added strength and fortitude.

So to 'follow me', meant to become like me and share my journey to revelation, and not to 'Follow Me' for a sense of life in the Book of Revelation.

That happens when you get old and forget what you sometimes just read while your mind is still racing with thoughts to share.

The Muslim Brotherhood was founded in 1928 in Egypt. It's credo is:

"God is our objective, the Koran is our Constitution, the Prophet is our leader, struggle [jihad] is our way, and death for the sake of God is the highest of our aspirations.”

When people or an organization state such beliefs and goals like those in the MB founding documemts quoted above I take them seriously. In 1924 while in prison Adolf Hitler wrote everything he planned to do if he and his Nazi's ever got power in Germany in his book "Mein Kampf" ("My Struggle"). Few people ever read this book before the end of the 1930's. Winston Churchill read it in 1929 and after Hitler took power in germany in 1933 WC did his best to warn Britain about Hitler's plans for war and he was laughed at by the establishment.

They weren't laughing at Winston Churchill when he became PM in 1940 with the Nazi's across the English Channel poised to invade Britain.

I don't see any indication of the MB ever becoming "diverse" or being tolerant with those words in it's founding documents clearly telling all Muslims and the world it's future goals are to spread Jihad. Was the attack on the USA Embassy in Cairo this past weekend by mobs just a tiny fringe group of the MB? I don't think so.

The new Egyptian government is now controlled by the MB (something we were told last year at the beginning of the "Arab Spring" could never happen) and it hasn't condemned Egyptian Mullahs preaching renewed persecution of the 9 million Coptic Christain minority in Egypt.

The founder of the MB was an Egyptian school teacher named Hasan al-Banna was a devout admirer of Adolf Hitler and the Nazis.

The MB did not have an auspicious beginning as an organization you could ever trust with it's founder a big fan of Hitler was it?

The MB is the parent organization of hamas and al Qaeda.

Mohammed the chief planner of the attack on 911 was a memeber of the MB.

As far as Iran and the MB are concerned I have read lots of stuff that indicates Iran sends the MB money and gives them support.

Let's remmeber that Musims will forget their religious divisions between their sects if it advances Islamic Jihad and leads toward a modern Caliphate (Islamic Empire).

It turns out that the creator of the film, "Sam Bacile," who claimed to be an Israeli is in fact a convicted bank fraud criminal on parole, one Nakoula Basseley Nakoulaam...an Egyptian. Oopsie-daisy. He's associated with Pastor Terry Jones, not with a mythical 100 Jews. Pastor Jones is the fellow who gets your brethren's knickers in a knot every time he threatens to burn a copy of the Koran.

And, as a staunch Zionist, let me assure you that coming up with or funding such a silly film isn't our style. Needlessly insulting, no artistic merit whatsoever and a sheer a waste of time and resources, as the antics you chaps get up to are already stranger then the strangest fiction.

This is all yet another diversion through religion to deter the public's attention once more from the fact that they're trying to sign another treaty, similar to ACTA, called The Trans-Pacific Partnership.Sign the petition against it at avaaz.org "3 Days to Stop the Corporate Death Star"Religion is and has always been a tool to control the masses.

The difference is that in Indonesia there are no restrictions and red tape if the majority Muslim population want to build a mosque. You read the article. It takes years and as long as a decade for Christans to get permission to build or even repair a church. Most of the time they never get permission.

Is there discrimination in Britain by any building commissions against building a mosque on the same location a church, synagogue, or a hindu temple would be given permission to be built or any location Muslims chose to buy property, and if the local zoning code permits, and built a mosque?

In other words, is there discrimination against Muslims to build, add to, or repair a mosque in the UK as there is for Christains in Indonesia by laws passed by the Muslim majority?

So far as I know their are no suicide bankers who blow themselves up with their bank employees when they have a bad day at the office dealing with their employees or kill female relatives and call it "bankers honor killing".

I like capitalism and freedom over life as a dhimmi (that's not to be confused with a dummy)under Islamic Law of Sharia.

@ His Grace - One hopes you are not trying to justify the violence due to a poor tasting video? I would certainly hope not and so won't infer that from this post. The film is probably dire, but still, there is no need for the violence (which does seem to be a minority of the faith)

@ innocent Muslim! - I find Islam quite interesting in what I have misunderstood about it. Having heard some comments by William Lane Craig on the topic, I find myself learning more and deciding it is far from the Truth. Having said that, is it not true that the Koran does advocate lying in wait, ambushing and killing the unbeliever? While Islam was in its infancy, it was tolerant, but once it became powerful enough, it soon suppressed other religions.

@ Len - thinking that the "Prince of the Power of the Air" has any power to delay Christ's return is theologically invalid - Christ will return exactly at the time the Father has ordained.

Pray for the Coptic Christians in Egypt. The crosses are going to hit the fans there soon and Coptic Christians could be killed by crazed Muslims rioting there because of the stupidity of the USA Government, ordered by the crypto Muslim Obama, to "out" the creators of this idiotic video.

The USA Federal Government has released the name of the maker of this film, an American Coptic Christain in Southern California, with a rather sleazy past who is on probation for financial crimes and being investigated for alleged illegal drug violations. He does not in any way represent the Coptic Christians in the USA who left persecution by the Islamic majority in Egypt to find religious fredom in the USA. The Coptic Christians in the USA represent the largest Cotpic community outside of Egypt. The man may be a small time crook but he lived under Muslim persecution as a Copt in Egypt so he does have a valid point: Islam sucks. So why not make a home made video about it?

Al Qaeda makes videos of Western hostages they capture. These followers of the moon god prophet Mohammed scream "ALLAH AKBAR" while brandishing their swords and then proceed, using a dull knife while the hostage screams, to slit the hostage's throat and then slowly cut off the head of their victim. We in the West don't riot and burn mosques when these videos are on the internet for the world to view.

The Obama Justice Department's politically correct word and thought gestapo thugs will throw the book at this man and his accomplices who made this film by making bogus hate crime allegations against them. How is it a hate crime exercising their First Amendment freedom of speech rights guaranteed in the USA Constitution when the makers of this video made no threats or any hint of violence against Muslims in this crudely made and amateurish video? The real hate crimes are what we are witnessing on TV today by mobs in Egypt, Lybia, Yemen, and other Muslim countries.

Using the "hate crime" theory from the President Obama point of view will make everyone American citizen who is critical of, mocks, loaths, or even says they hate (it's not a crime to say you hate a person or a group so long as you do not atcually threaten them) Islam a candidate for hate crime charges. Including people who say these things when they visit chat rooms, blogs, and post stuff on Youtube.

Islam now has the ability to influence freedom of speech in Western Democracies.

Islam will soon control speech in your country, no matter where you live, under the guise of "hate speech" and get the UN, the EU courts, the USA Government or your government to enforce this insane concept.

What is happening in Egypt and elsewhere is the Danish cartoon of Mohammed published in a Danish newspaper a few years ago which lit the short fuse of Muslim fanatics and caused the Islamic world to go berserk and burn Danish Embassies magnified 10,000 times.

What we see in Egypt and Lybia today is the real "Arab Spring" (Arab Winter) set in motion: Islamic Jihad taking over Egypt and the Middle East.

The Islamofacists are now breaking into the German embassy in Sudan to complain about the film. Quite what they think the German govt can do about the film who knows? Perhaps any apologists might wish to explain what they think should be done about the perpetrators of genocide in Darfur before providing their explanations.

Rather droll, how events today seem like a replay of the Muslim Barbary Pirates days. Ransom...I think they now call it "foreign assistance"...didn't work too well after a while. But a little courage and a series of harsh lessons employing state-of-the-art pyrotechnics and kinetics did. Give our guvs time, your lordship, they'll figure it out soon enough.

It now appears that the Youtube version of the movie trailer the Muslim world is now on fire with rage about was quite possibly a tampered version of the original trailer. The films's 14 minute trailer after it was posted on Youtube has the name Muhammed and anti-Islam remarks are clearly dubbed over the original words spoken by the actors. The sloppy editing calls into question wether the Hollywood film was, in fact really created as an anti- Muslim film, or simply editied to look that way. Those involved in making the film say it was originally called "Desert Warrior" instead of "Innocence of Muslims". Actors in the movie claim it was about Egypt 2,000 years ago 600 years before Mohammed was born.

What we may have in the 14 minute trailer called "Innocence of Muslims" on Youtube was in fact a hoax cleverly edited by Muslim radicals which was deliberately played on TV stations in Egypt and other Muslim countries which enraged Muslims in Egypt to riot and burn the USA Embassy in Cairo,the attack on the USA Embassy in Benghazi, Lybia resulting in the death of the American Ambassador and three USA Marines.

If it is proved the 14 minute trailer on youtube was a hoax the CIA can prove it IF Obama gives permission do do so.

I salute General Kitchiner and other great British military leaders like Vice Admiral Horatio Nelson, hero of the Battle of Trafalgar. They and other British heros past and present would show these Muslim terrorists a thing ot two.

Yes, three cheers for USA naval officer Stepehen Decatur who on orders from President Thomas Jefferson led the USA Navy to fight the Barbary Pirates and end their 300 year long white European slave trade in the late 1700's and early 1800's when the USA Marines defeated the Muslim pirates at Tripoli, Lybia in 1805. Anyone who knows the "Marine Hymn" of the USA Marines knows that the line in it "... to the shores of tripoli..." comes from that famous battle at Tripoli over 200 years ago.

USA naval officer Stephen Decatur and President Thomas Jefferson examples of those "UUUNITED STATES" Southern (Decatur from Maryland and Jefferson from virginia) "hicks" the truck driver mocked not long ago when he sneered at American southeners from the Ozarks in Arkansas.

Arkansas has produced fine American soldiers and sailors both during the Civil war for the South and for the United States in WW'S I & II, Korea, Viet nam and the War in Terrorism.

I can think of another American who would also kick Muslim ass to their pagan moon god on the moon. WW II, United States General George S Patton, who the Nazi's feared. His ancestors also came from the American South, Virginia, and fought with courage and honor for the Confederacy. Patton is another one of those Americans from the South our friend from north of the border I am sure sneers at as being stupid American hayseeds.

I have to be honest, I find it very difficult to restrain the desire that some U.S. Marines hadn't come to the rescue with extreme prejudice for any life but those they are entrusted to defend. Except of course that had anything of the sort occurred, we would not be hearing of heroic U.S. Ambassadors lynched (and possibly raped), but the vicious U.S. military indiscriminately firing on demonstraters exercising their right to protest.

Alas, as righteous as such sentiments enable me to feel, I don't think it's particularly healthy to let them win out. Mostly because I suspect it is uncannily close to the way that many people coming out Friday prayers will be tempted to feel. Some human justice, with perpetrators standing trial would certainly help to salve the situation and make clear the importance of rule of law. But even then, it will probably not be enough.

Magee hissed with frothy spittle flying: ..."hicks" the truck driver mocked not long ago when he sneered at American southeners from the Ozarks in Arkansas.Magee

Dude, you don't get it do you? I'm a hick. I drive 18 wheeler tractor-trailers, chill with other truckers in the truckstop lounges, groove to country-and-western on the roads, like my Marlboroughs and Buds, been a Teamster and worked construction in Maryland, Tennessee and Alabama. Believe it or not, many of us know which fork goes with what and we can chat with the best of them; some of us are PhD's, lots of real artists and writers in the crowd and I've met three former docs over the years. So, I can call my brother hicks hicks, but you cain't, cuz you's a stuck-up panty-waist who, to borrow an expression I heard in Nevada, sh*its higher than his head.

There us something "fishy" about this video trailer that has got the Muslim world in the Middle East worked up into a frenzy of hatred of the USA.

#1 The makers of the movie claim it's original title was "Desert Warrior".

#2 The trailer that was released in Egypt and the Middle East was called " Innocence of Muslims".

#3 Actors in this stupid film say it is about Egypt 2,000 years ago, 600 years before Mohammed was born.

#4 People who have seen the Muslim Brotherhood version of the trailer say it's obvious that anti- Islamic "hate speech" was dubbed over the original dialogue.

#5 This movie is 100% DUMB!

I want the CIA to analize the Muslim version that was shown to the people of the Middle East to see if it was tampered with in any way and if it was, which is not impossible, considering who we are dealing with, the Muslim Brotherhood, tell the world.

We in the West MUST NOT give in to these retrogrades and give up our freedom of speech to please them or we are all finished.

Shame on the USA Government for daring to suggest that the people who made this idiotic film should in any way be punished for exercising their Constitutional rights.

Defeat Obama the most incompetent President the USA has ever had after Jimmy Carter.

I apologize, You see we do have a lot in common. I have a big chip on my shoulder too for reasons I might share with you someday.

My mother's family losing everything to Communism in 1948 when they took over Czechoslovakia has not made be a bog fan of Marxism oir left wingers.

In my past life I was a former graphic designer having worked in that field professionally from the early 70's until the mid 80's. For 2 1/2 years I attended CMU as a graphic design major and dropped out when I discovered that working in advertising, Pittsburgh in the 1970's was the the 3rd city largest corporate city in the USA. It was then headquaarters headquaters for H. J.Heinz, Rockwell International, Alcoa, US Steel which gives you and idea of what kind of companies were there then, was better than paying for school. I liked making money not boring classes I guess because I was in the USA Navy for four years after high school and university became a bore. Back then, before computers everything was done by hand, cut & paste up (it had a different menaing then) on a drawing board and sent to the printer with illustrations & photos. I did all of that plus illustrations and creating logos. This was all before computers.

I have worked since I had my first job at 13 working as a stock boy at a drug store, mowing lawns, cleaning people's attics and garages, and weeding gardens, grocery stock boy. Anything to make a dollar. When I was an enlisted man in the USA Navy I had my share of "field days" cleaning toilets, work spaces, and did manual labor and left the Navy as a Photographers mate 3rd class so I am not unfamilair with your wiorld and definatley am NOT a panty-waiste.

My GI bill helped pay for university and I worked part tme also. I never got a penny from my family even though I could have but it was unthinkable to ask.

I had other jobs after 20 years in adverstising which drained my energy by the mid 1980's.

Some of my favorite illustrators include Maxfield Parrish, Andrew Wyeth, and J.C.Leyendecker.. and from the 1970's the American illustrator Mark English. Look their work up please.

I am an unashamed lover of realism in the fine arts.

One of my favorite contemporay American fine artist's is Peter Poskas and I admire the Russian painter Konstantine Somov who died in 1939.

That's a partial resume of my life and interests.

My favorite memory. A morning spent with my late wife alone with no other tourists at Monet's garden at Giverny in October 1985.

Next time you are driving down USA 79 through Wetsren Pennsylvania I am retired and live in Waynesburg, Pennsylvania.

LOL. Brilliant description of MageeYou certainly do have a way with words..'.stuck up panty waist' is impressive and worth plagiarising :)

Magee inspires colourful insults. I hope he is keeping a copy of them taped to his bar fridge.Don't visit him. His house will be the one with the giant neon lit crucifix at the letter box,barrel of a shot gun poking through.

Some human justice, with perpetrators standing trial would certainly help to salve the situation and make clear the importance of rule of law.

The killing of an ambassador is an act of war and must be treated as such. There is in any case no possibility of justice through a court in this situation. Neither would it suffice to punish the perpetrator in this manner. The political cost to the United States cannot be redressed by punishing a private individual. The consequences must therefore be born by the collective. And those consequences must be severe so that the next potential aggressor learns to fear.

Don't ever forget the consequences of Mogadishu. Clinton ran away, and Al Qaida concluded that the Americans would run if hit hard enough. Thus was the WTC bombed. Thus was the Kenyan Embassy bombed. Thus was the USS Cole attacked. Thus was there a 9/11. If Clinton had responded by sending 25,000 troops to Mogadishu with the mission of killing every Aidid soldier; if he had tracked down the leadership behind the attack, stripped them naked and hung them by the neck until dead in the public square; if he had turned over any prisoners to Aidid's most bitter enemies, then none of those attacks would have happened. The enemy would have concluded that if you attack the Americans, they will come and kill you. There wouldn't have been 3000 dead in the Twin Towers.

It is time that the West awakened and realised exactly what the intentions of militant Islam are.Many in the Arab Nations wanted Democracy and a Society free from oppression and poverty.The West(Christian Nations) helped them on the road to liberty but the Muslim Brotherhood has used this bid for Democracy and the resultant upheaval and disorder to gain power.Now Christians in these Arab Countries are in a extremely dangerous position.The Mullahs at the traditional Friday prayers' are 'whipping the people into a frenzy'with all the resultant disorder and attacks on Christians and anything' Western'.

The response by Islam to any revelations about its true nature are met with violence,killings and wholesale destruction and are meant to intimidate and to silence any opposition.

Unfortunately' appeasement' will not work with Islam as Carl Jacobs has so clearly pointed out.

I don't know enough about Mogadishu to be able to comment on whether or not a robust response would have prevented further atrocities.

Would you advocate literally sending the troops into Libya and Eygpt? I only ask because it wasn't that long ago that the US avoided doing anything of the sort. Aren't you usually in favour of avoiding getting involved in foreign entanglements? I realise there's a "national interest" angle here, but unless the assault was primarily indiscriminate via air or sea (and we've discussed the morality of such actions before - you know where I'd stand on that), I can't see the outcome as being anything other than more US dead.

I oppose sending US Forces into harm's way for causes devoid of any US National interest. Thus I opposed sending troops to Somalia. I opposed committing forces to Bosnia. I opposed the operations in Libya. It goes without saying that the American Ambassador would still be alive if Ghadaffi was still in power. But this is now a matter of US national interest. Something must be done, and it must be punitive. Normally this response could be directed against the power and symbols of the state. But Libya is a mess. So what then?

In this case, there is no need for indiscriminate air bombardment or troops. My initial thought is to destroy the infrastructure that sustains the city. Power grid. Transportation hubs. Communications centers. It would not take long for the pain to be felt, and that pain would be severe. People who spend their days looking for water will have neither the time nor the energy to kill American ambassadors. They will feel the lash and they will learn.

Why do you think they are targeting western embassies? Because they think the West is weak. Show them the West is strong and they will stop.

I doubt that Obama would do any of what you have suggested, given that he won't even threaten Iran with military action over the development of a nuclear weapon and recently snubbed Israel's Prime Minster (despite the clear US obligation and interest in the middle east).

But then Obama is on form there as he spent 4 years upsetting key allies, such as Britain, especially over slights to us diplomatically and his lack of support over issues like the Falklands, whilst toadying up to the likes of Russia - with little payback- and prefers 'transaction' relationships with allies.

This will have an effect when the US is finally forced in intervene in the middle east again.

It was amazing to see Europeans, politicians and regualr people, on cable news programs positively gaga in 2008 over this man. It was like God Almighty had returned to earth.He was called a "genius" and would bring peace to the world and convince Muslims to give up Jihad and hold hands with the Jews and let Israel live in peace and forget about converting the world to Islam. The world would be perfect. The black messiah had at last arrived and Europeans were kissing his feet. He KNEW Islam and would convince Musims to respect other cultures and religions... Look at the news today.

Europeans knew nothing about Obama in 2008.I hope they know him by now.

He has done his best as a good radical left winger to wreck the USA internally and try and destroy it's military.

Obama's past is mixed up with Marxists, a white hating, liberaion theology, anti Semitic minister, and left wing terrorists who made bombs which killed police and civilians in the late 1960's and early 70's ( Bill Ayres)

It was no surprise to us when one of Obama's first acts as President was to send the bust of Winston Churchill in the oval office back to the British Embassy in Washington. The same bust PM Blair gave President Bush after the attack on 911 which Bush kept in the oval office for 7 years for inspiration in the war on Islamic terrorists. That act of rudely returning the bust of Churchill to the British Embassy by Obama was a symbol of his loathing of Britain because of how his father's country, Kenya, was supposedly abused by the British under colonial rule.

@carl jacobs

I have reached the point where I think the USA should get out of NATO and all international treaty agreements and let the world destroy itself so long as the violence doesn't reach our shores.I could care less if a future Chinese super power takes over Asia and Australia or if a rising Nationalist Russian Super Power wants to invade Europe at some future point in time. I do worry about a Muslim Caliphate and that is the problem with becoming an isolationist.

The important thing is that the USA get out of NATO and as soon as possible.

I genuinely understand the desire to have some form of punishment - but you would inflict greater instability on a population of civilians, the majority of whom played no part in the Ambassador's brutal murder?

It's very difficult to see how this differs from the argument made by Islamists that all Americans are reasonable targets because they are collectively responsible for (as they see it) working against the interests of Islam in the Middle East, and particularly Israel.

Then offer me a workable alternative. Because sending a few operatives to chase after ghosts in the post-revolutionary chaos of Libya isn't acceptable. They won't find anyone. Even if they could find someone, the punishment they could inflict will not compensate for the political damage they have inflicted. What might loosely be called Gov't in Libya doesn't have the means or the will to carry the fight. Given our experience in Pakistan, I wouldn't trust them even if they said they would. So what does that leave?

The US cannot let its ambassadors be killed. It will happen again if it is not punished. I don't know how to effectively punish this aggressor without broad impacts anymore than I could tell you how starvation could have been avoided in Japan in 1945 with the US Navy sinking every Japanese freighter in sight. It's the nature of war. But I am willing to be persuaded that there is another way. Just so long as that other way doesn't involve words like 'courts' and 'police' and 'search warrants' and 'trials.'

As I am not a "European" I cannot say how Europeans thought of Obama in 2008. As I am British and married to an American, then I can tell you I can see a good speaker and salesman when I see one. But that was about all, as I am adept at being a tad cynical. As for the other section of your analysis, I can only say that if America went back to isolation then you'd suddenly have to find a way to pay for your balance of payments deficit and your budget deficit, either by raising taxes, cutting consumption or by cutting spending, especially your vast defence budget, as you would no longer benefit from the dollar being a reserve currency.

No apology required for not spotting me as a redneck, John Magee. I'm very good at pretending to be civilized. But having slaved in graphics for about 20 years (and still a bit now) myself, I guess that makes us both partial panty-waists. Then again working paste-up with the waxer, t-square, the blue pencil, acetate overlays, the light table, laying out newsletters by calculating in picas and making borders with Letraset line tape mitigates that. Sounds like you left the field when computers intruded; I went over to the dark side with a Mac Plus and the early versions of MacWrite and Adobe Pagemaker in the mid-80s and then ventured into Web design, but still miss the therapeutic late-night paste-up work. And I still keep my light table and waxer in the basement. I wonder how many here know what we're talking about.

Thanks for the invite; I'll take you up on it when I go through beautiful Pennsylvania, but I traded my US trips for some Northern Ontario routes at least until next July. Need to keep my marriage healthy by at least spending weekends at home. With schedules being what they are and the awkwardness of rumbling about with a Volvo 780 and trailer through unfamiliar city streets, though, I usually meet folks at nearby truck stops and keep to coffee even when done driving for the day, for as much as I love my brew and my scotch, I'm an uncompromising Temperance man when on the highways.

Bluedog, not sure what conclusions you are drawing from the defacing of the Trappist monestery in Israel by the unknown vandals who are believed to be Jewish right-wingers upset over the Migron decision. Perhaps I'm misreading you and you're trying to show what a proper response to bigotry and vandalism should be, for in the link you gave we learn that activists with the right-wing organization Im Tirtzu expressed their outrage at the incident and traveled to the monastery on Tuesday afternoon to clean off the graffiti, bringing flowers for the monks. I note as well that Israel's Defense Minister, Ehud Barak, flew off the handle when he condemned the attack and issued a call to the Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency), police and state prosecution to “tackle Jewish terrorism." Now, that's something. But wait, there's more, our dear Ehud soars to greater heights: "This must be fought with an iron fist, and we must put an end to these severe phenomenons (sic.) that stain the name of the State of Israel. We are obligated to uproot this phenomenon.” Well, at least Ehud didn't call for air strikes against vandals.

Our synagogues, cemeteries, community centres and Jewish day schools here in Toronto get tagged now and again. Swastikas, my portrait (beard and hooked nose caricatures), Christ-killer accusations, very naughty curses in Arabic, the usual sort of stuff. We clean it up as fast as we can as it upsets the ladies and the kids. No offers yet from anyone to help us clean the stuff up, no flowers either and neither our defense ministry in Ottawa or CSIS, our national security service, have been directed to deal with the issue. Thank goodness we're spared of such embarrassments. Am I supposed to be drawing conclusions from that about all Christians? All Muslims? About Canada? Am I wrong in thinking that the problem with low-level hate crimes and vandalism is due to the difficulties in apprehension, getting a conviction in face of unreasonably high reasonable-doubt standards and excessive leniency in sentencing by the courts?

PS: bluedog, as for the Gospels-tearing MK in Israel's Knesset chamber, the man may be a rude idiot, but a total moron he's not, for he was clever enough to avail himself of parliamentary immunity. Outside he would been hit with criminal charges and might have done serious time when convicted.

you all are bastards kaffar.what if the film was made on urban Jesus or Moses........ hahaaaaaahaaa. you 'll be the fuel of hell...inshallah.judgement day is very far, you all will burn and killed here in world by ! Allah.

I have thought long and hard about your response. If you took my delay in replying as an admission of an inability to reply, then you would not be far from the truth.

I intended to write about how God responded to Mankind when we offended His majesty and murdered His Representative (as well as more than a few of His messengers) by dragging Him through the streets to crucifixion. I still think there is something vital to be found in the Passion on this instance: but I'll admit that at the moment I'm struggling to pull it out. Perhaps you'll be able to help clarify my thoughts.

But the most honest response I can give you is that I don't see how justice is going to win out. My optimist side says that working with the Libyan government to secure judicial trials of the perpetrators might help strengthen Libya's (and I suppose Egypt's) civil government, but I'm too realistic to think that it would probably result in anything other than a net loss to their credibility as "American patsies".

It seems to me that there is not going to be any justice in this world for Ambassador Stevens or his family. The kind of civic punishment you propose seems tempting - and similar things have been tried before. Many have simply exacerbated violence and ill will - but I doubt the US could do anything by itself to improve its reputation in many Middle Eastern Countries - it is damned there whatever it does.

But that to my mind means that the final arbiter of what is reasonable must lie with us. If the majority of the region will respond negatively to the US whether it provides them with a reason to fuel conspiracy theories by supporting present governments, or provides them with martyrs by going in heavy handed - then the only court of opinion with any relevancy left is the West, and more specifically the US. Are the US willing to undertake actions in the Middle East that they would not countenance on their own soil? Are Americans behind a mentality that essentially says "when in Libya...", and so justify one set of democratic and accountable behaviours at home and another for the wastes of the world beyond? I doubt there will be much anyone else can realistically do if this is the case. Or does America believe in behaving like Americans wherever they go? That the Rule of Law, just process, transparency, and constitutional safeguards should govern its behaviour in all the arenas it finds itself? That's about the only argument I can muster, I'm afraid.

I am not a pacifist and wouldn't hesitate to unleash Britain's defence forces onto an enemy that tried to hurt her.

However, I will offer to play devil's advocate here, which is the flip side of Carl's argument: (note I am not saying that I agree or disagree, but merely wish to point out that one needs a clear headed and sober strategy when dealing with these events) :

Do you remember when the IRA attempted to decapitate the whole British government when they bombed the Conservative party conference?

By Carl Jacob's view that was "an act of war", which it was because the IRA had just tried to kill off the whole British cabinet.

(At the time many Americans were funding the terrorism of IRA-Sinn Fein and viewed them as "freedom fighters").

Now what do you think if Thatcher had ordered an air strike against Belfast and specifically power stations, water supply and other utilities, thus making the Irish too busy finding food and water than to murder the British government? (Carl's suggestion).

Imagine if that were today- you, your wife and any children you may or may not have and if I may suggest,the majority of the people of Belfast- totally innocent people- would bear the brunt of what is called 'collective punishment'.

Is that right?

Is it Christian?

Would that not have made the British into savages?

Or would have it "solved" the problem of IRA terrorism in one daring gambit?

First off - I don't see the IRA bombing of the Conservative Party Conference as an act of war - it was an act of murder and terrorism. At that point the IRA did not represent the majority view in either Northern Ireland or Ireland, and it certainly did not enjoy any association with a legitimate state.

But my answer to your point is simple: had the British done as you suggest, it would be a war crime. I suspect from a practical point of view it would have alienated all but the most trenchant Unionists (who in any case, have long felt alienated by Westminster), and more than that, I think it would have been a moral capitulation of any right to retain Northern Ireland as a constituent part of the UK. Not in the sense that Northern Ireland would have automatically become part of a new united Ireland - in fact, in such appalling circumstances I'd favour the Craig option of an independent Orange State.

I see no contradiction in utterly repudiating the IRA and every other member of the alphabet soup, and also insisting that the government and the armed forces be held up to rigorous standards. I am in no way opposed to investigations like the Bloody Sunday Inquiry - because it seems to me a fundamental point of law that the military must be held accountable. We can't just go in and shoot whoever we please, regardless of how degraded the situation becomes. Does that mean I think the army should never be deployed? Not in the least - but it's always worth remembering that when the army first came to Northern Ireland it was to restore Rule of Law, and to protect Catholic citizens from attack. So long as it behaves according to these principles, the IRA and the UVF and the UDA can be squared up to and treated for what they are: terrorist thugs. The minute the army starts messing about as if it can do whatever the hell it wants, on what basis but brute force does it hold any superiority?

It seems to me that Carl Jacob's'solution' would mean murdering thousands of innocent people in order that the guilty be taught some sort of a lesson and think twice before killing Americans again ir be too busy to do so.

It would be morally wrong a crime against humanity - the end it seeks does not justify the means - and in any event would fail in its objective. The guilty would not learn and the majority would be further radicalised.

Thank you for helping me clarify - I understood that you were not in fact advocating carpet bombing Belfast :)

The only thing I would say is that whilst I feel confident defending a UK stance, I'm not sure that lecturing the USA is much of a wise move either. I *do* respect the importance of the sovereignty of nations, and recognise that whilst we share much in the way of cultural patrimony, the US has its own history and perspective of its role in the world distinct from what we would like it to be.

One of the sad truths about war crimes is that there is often little ability to see perpetrators brought to justice. There have been equally ignoble stains on our own nation for which we have never really answered.

Quite right- I would never presume to give either Mr Jacobs or the Americans a lecture; I am reminded of when Truman sacked McCarthur for wanting to use atomic weapons against Korea/China.

I appreciate that there must be a response to the murder of the US Ambassador, but I don't think that firing missiles off is the solution- totally counter productive and a better way would be to nip this in the bud by arresting the masterminds responsible.

I cannot say I am the best counter terrorism expert, but terrorist cells by their very nature tend to be small, not large. Get the handful and you have the many.

Take them out, beef up security (e.g. American troops defending their assets in these countries) and you probably won't have a repetition.

Having said that, when Iran is taken out, this will change the ball game.

a better way would be to nip this in the bud by arresting the masterminds responsible.

There are two insuperable problems with this tactic.

1. There is no practical way to implement it. Who for example would effect the arrest? The US is the only interested party and any arrest by the US would need to be preceded by an armed invasion. The guilty leadership would make itself scarce and the US would find itself fighting a long guerrilla war with no discernible endpoint other than rebuilding Libya. I for one have no interest in attempting a futile effort at fixing the problems in Libya. The US does not exist to rebuild failed nation states.

If not the US, then who? The Europeans? They wouldn't in the first p[lace. It would be unseemly for the US to expect the Europeans to avenge an American Ambassador in any case? Who else? The Libyan Gov't is not capable of doing it. They don't have the power or the will. The attempt would probably collapse what little gov't exists. And certainly there would be no broad support for the effort in the Libyan population.

Arresting the guilty is a neat and clean solution. But it simply can't be done. The ICC can't simply issue an arrest warrant and produce the defendants in the dock. Someone has to go and get them.

2. The punishment doesn't redress the damage to the prestige of the US. Suppose we could catch and hang a few people in leadership. Those few people become in essence casualties of war to the other side. Their loss does not detract from the victory that is found in killing an ambassador with impunity. The cause may have lost a few people, but people can be replaced. The cause achieved a victory and the cause goes on.

This is why 9/11 could not be redressed by arresting, trying, and executing OBL. The political impact to the US would still be out of all proportion to any possible punishment that could be inflicted on a single man. A trial means Al Qaida wins even if OBL is dead. Instead of a trial, the cause behind 9/11 had to be fought and defeated. It is the cause for which they fight that matters. Individuals only matter to the extent that their deaths represents marginal cost to the cause.

This is why I openly asked for n alternative. People suggest unworkable schemes that serve principally to keep their own hands clean. But I will say it again. Doing nothing is not an option. Something must be done commensurate with constraints outlined above. Sucking it up is simply not acceptable. It demonstrates weakness, and weakness will only beget more attacks.

One of the central problems in responding to this murder of an American ambassador is that Libya doesn't really have a functioning gov't. By which I mean, it doesn't possess one of the prerequisites for a functioning gov't - a monopoly on the employment of violence. That's probably why this happened in fact. If Ghadaffi was still in power, this wouldn't have happened. But the West decided to bring chaos ... excuse me ... the Arab Spring to Libya and this is the consequence.

If an attack like this happens, you can normally trust that the gov't in question will act on your behalf. It normally has every interest in doing so. First, it has been internationally embarrassed. Second, it has every interest in restoring its monopoly on the use of violence. Plus, you have a natural fallback. If you decide the Gov't doesn't have an interest in doing so, then you can bring punitive pressure directly onto the gov't in question. You can attack its base of power directly. In this case, you have decided that the attack on your embassy was a de facto declaration of war. Confir with Iran in 1979, and what Jimmy Carter should have done about it.

So let's assume the IRA kills off the British gov't. The UK would have every expectation that Ireland would act on its behalf. There would be no need to attack Ireland. But there is an important caveat. It is an interesting counterfactual to think how Britain would have responded to the death of its entire gov't. I know how I would have responded - "The effort against the IRA must be removed from the court of law and placed into the court of armed conflict." That would have been my demand of the Irish gov't. No candy-ass police searches and rules of evidence. I wouldn't risk the IRA pulling out victory because of clever lawyers. The benefits to the IRA would be too great and the consequences too small. The IRA must be smashed by whatever means necessary. What if Ireland refused? A very good question for which I have no immediate answer. That's where the interesting counterfactual starts.

Libya on the other hand offers no lever for redress. There is no overarching authority that is easy to pressure. There is no good way to get directly at the aggressor. There is no good way to even identify him. So you are left with indirect means that have broad scope. Or you can go home, display weakness, and wait for the next attack. That's what happened after Mogadishu. We know how well that worked.

It's funny. In WWII, we blew up dams knowing full well that people lived below them in the path of the water. We flattened whole towns with artillery just to clear a path for Army. We systematically destroyed transportation routes. We destroyed shipping knowing full well we would create massive famine as a result. We would have given our eye teeth to shut down industry by destroying power plants. And we wouldn't have spent a single sleepless night over the impact on the enemy population for any of this. Suddenly access to a power plant has become a basic human right? Please.

But as I said. This was just my initial thought. I am not wedded to it. I am open to other solutions. But those solutions have to be effective. If all you have to offer is "Heroically and nobly suffer for the sake of justice" or "Issue arrest warrants" then you have nothing constructive to say. Radicalization occurs when force is met with weakness. That is simply not a viable option.

I think I was complete in my answers. I didn't deliberately avoid responding directly to you. Nor did I think you were having trouble answering. I haven't ever noticed you having difficulty responding. There isn't a person on this board whose opinion I respect more.

In summary, I guess I take a practical view of war. You stated:

The minute the army starts messing about as if it can do whatever the hell it wants, on what basis but brute force does it hold any superiority?

That isn't really the right way to state the problem. It's not about doing whatever is desired but doing whatever is necessary. Those efforts will still be under authority, but sometimes you have to cut the judges out of the loop. In 1861, Abraham Lincoln imprisoned some Confederate-sympathizing politicians from the state of Maryland. Why? Because half of Washington DC is Maryland, and Maryland wasn't going to leave the Union. The Chief Justice of the Supreme Court ordered Lincoln to release these men. Lincoln (politely) told the court to go intercourse itself. The men stayed in prison. Some men think Lincoln a tyrant for acts like this. I think he saved the Union.

Take your own example of the IRA. If the IRA had managed to kill off the entire British cabinet, I have no reasonable doubt that Britain would have outright rejected an Irish claim of "We can't prosecute for lack of evidence." The issue can't stop there, and rule of law be damned. You can't have your entire gov't killed and do nothing about it. I have some thoughts about how to handle that situation, too. In the aftermath of such an attack, I suspect they would be well-received.

Actually part of the problem in Northern Ireland was that the British Government had long since abandoned "We can't prosecute for lack of evidence" through the policy of internment where they rounded up known and suspected members of terrorist organisations (and their families) and detained them without trial.

I have long retained some sympathy for the fact that very often the security forces knew who the perpetrators were - much like the communities themselves where attacks on the opposing side were usually open secrets (it was the attacks on their own side that have generally remained part of the legacy of the missing victims). It must have been frustrating to have a terrorist and a murderer in sight but not be able to do anything about it in a civic court of law.

But the original Internment operation in the early 70s prompted waves of rioting, with many soldiers being ambushed. And more importantly than that, I think, was the effect it had in the long term on the mentality of the security forces and Special Branch. Internment as a policy ended in 1975, but it had far more reaching effects. To give you a personal example, my Uncle-in-Law like you had served his country in the army for many years. He had come out, and was working in civvy street, part of the well-to-do class of Ulstermen, with quite genuinely nothing but revulsion for terrorism (of either variety) and support for the British Army. He got rounded up as a "routine" excercise by Special Branch, got interogated for hours, was told that his family were in prison and that his mother had died of a heart-attack, and was told that the unofficial agreement regarding protection of former servicemen and RUC officers in Northern Ireland was going to be withdrawn (which at that time could be tantamount to leaving his whole family open to attack). The reason? Nothing, - nothing personally. Special Branch had just got into the habit of arresting whoever the hell they liked in order to fish for information. I don't know how you would feel if your country treated you in that manner, but to this day my Uncle-in-law has made it quite clear that he will not ever serve them again.

Northern Ireland isn't Libya - so I'm not saying that a military response to Ambassador Steven's murder would result in you being arrested. But I think if anything can be learnt from Northern Ireland, it's that prolongued and nasty conflicts in which there is no civic justice - or even the veneer of civic justice - are not edifying to either side, even if one side begins in a much stronger moral position. I agree that sometimes you do, for practical reasons, have to cut judges out of the loop. I just think that when you do it, you should be prepared for what follows - not only in terms of the enemy, but your own forces.

In respect of Northern Ireland, agree that in terms of specifics it is not the best comparison to make, given that it was a foreign Ambassador that was murdered. Perhaps we need to start looking up the Boxer Rebellion of 1900 as a better comparison.

What Carl is giving us is a tactical way of dealing with the immediate issue, but not the long term strategy of what to do in that region(for example policy towards the more dangerous threat of Iran).

I have to admit I am a bit perplexed by the sheer complexity of hatreds in Northern Ireland, although as some of my family are descended from the Southern Unionist and in that sense I am an old romantic so, I would like to see Ireland united again, but within the UK.

I did look up the reference to the civil war and it seems that Lincoln got away with what he did, in part because the Supreme Court was made up of Southerners and led by Justice Tanney, who had made himself a hate figure in Northern abolitionist circles by the Dred Scott case in the 1850s.

You make a fair point. It is a point I have considered, and it scares me. But it serves to highlite the complete inability of traditional law enforcement to solve this problem, and that knowledge is where I begin. What do you do about indiginous paramilitary organizations once the court system is shown to be totally ineffective? The answer cannot be "Nothing."

To be fair to myself, however, I was dealing with a specific and severe example. I wasn't speaking about an ordinary bomb blast in a public place as terrible as that may be. I was speaking about an attack on the gov't, and that kind of attack will significantly escalate the necessary level of response. What do you do when a paramilitary organization kills the entire cabinet of your gov't? And how do you react when the responsible individuals take refuge in a neighboring foreign country? If I just lead such an operation, I wouldn't hang around a place where the (very angry and motivated) British Army held dominion. I would beat feet across the border and disappear into my supporting infrastructure. But such men still have to be got. It doesn't matter whose sovereign soil they stand upon.

The US has been targeting and killing Al Qaida operatives for quite a while. These are extrajudicial killings. We identify the bad guys. We track them. We intercept them. They die. It's very effective. It's very distruptive. It works. And it's necessary. This is the correct model for dealing with terrorism. It would be well to apply this model in Libya. But I don't think we wil ever know who carried out the attack.

In pragmatic terms? I'd imagine upping defence is important. Re-addressing security protocols. Putting pressure on governments in similarily volatile countries to ensure that the appalling murders in Libya, and the gross assaults in Egypt are not repeated around the world.

I'm not entirely aversed to selective assassinations where the individuals are obviously culpable. Don't get me wrong - I'd prefer them to be court martialled and hung - but I accept that sometimes it is necessary to take out clear dangers to the safety of civilians. Thus, whilst I would have preferred to see Osama Bin Laden stand trial - I can appreciate the considerable difficulties involved in capture, not to mention the relative simplicity with which a quick shot ended a man responsible for thousands of deaths and an utterly evil regime in Afghanistan.

I just think it can be very easy to slip from taking the shot because its the only option, to taking the shot because it's the easiest option. I'd been thinking about the response to the Munich Massacre prior to your most recent post, and I think it gives a helpful analogy. Inasmuch as it brought the perpetrators and planners to justice, it was a success - and there is no doubt that nobody else in the world would have put anything like enough effort into getting them. From a military perspective, I'm sure it had a long-term effect on fear of Israel, which may in itself have mitigated assaults on civilian populations. But the longer it dragged on, the sloppier it got. The early assassinations were clean and decisive - but the longer they pursued their enemies the more it resulted in collateral deaths. I've also read that it reduced Mossad's focus on defence, with consequences for some of the latter attacks against Israel.

That I guess is part of the same problem in Northern Ireland: the virtue of civic justice, it seems to me, is that it should always come into the picture sooner rather than later. It brings a certain amount of control to proceedings, it checks rage, and it necessarily imposes limits - yes, limits which may mean that some people escape, but limits that also prevent us teetering over the edge into a place that ends up weakening us. I guess it is a devilish balance.

During WW II the Allies carpet bombed German cities and killed almost a million German citizens in the process, bombed cities in occupied Europe, even bombed Rome with bombs hitting the Vatican.

We never cared if churches were destroyed. It was total war.

The German Army in 1944 took over th oldest Monastery in the the Latin Church originally built by the founder of Western monasticisn, St Benedict, in 549 AD, a month long bloody battle followed with the resulting in total destruction of this ancient monastery. After the War the Benedictine monks rebuilt their beautiful mountain top Abbey and chapel.

Later in the War in northern Italy a monastery and the refectory (monk's dining room) near Milan were destoyed in an Allied air raid on Milan. On the wall of the refectory was Leonardo da Vinci's famous painting of the Last Supper which was amazingly untouched even though the ceiling and other walls had collapsed.

My point is that today our Military in Afghanistan (and also in Iraq before we left) are not allowed to shell or have air support blow up the mosque where the shots came. They can enter the mosque and fire on the terrorists but even then they must be "careful".

The USA State Department calls Muslim Jihadists attacks "man made disasters" in order to not "offend" those who plan to kill us in the name of their cult.

We are doomed with this kind of an attitude that would have never even been dreamed of in past wars.

Wars are to win not cater to the demands of the enemy's religion. which in the war on terrorism IS the cause.

Deeply impressed that truck drivers today like you discuss the fine arts and philosophy, maybe even a little Plato and Aristotle at the picnic tables at the rest stops while eating some wine and cheese with other truckers from places like Alabama?

So what do you talk about with these truck drivers (lorry drivers) at the rest stops?

Kierkegaard, Schopenhauer, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel?

Do you discuss Existentialism with the truckers over coffee?

I am even more impressed with your hit about having a Phd.

Atcually I know a few truck drivers here in my small town of about 5,000. Wonderful men with common sense. They don't talk BS.

Within 5 minutes of my house here in SW Pennsylvanaia I can take walk on a country road through the beautiful rolling hills here with woods and farmland on each side of the road and maybe see a deer or two. It's certainly different from the life I had living in a major city north of here all my life.

From my back windows and veranda I over the tree tops I have fine view of the Greek Revival chapel with it's fine Wren steeple belonging to the Presbyterian University located here.

At noon and 6PM the carillon in the university chapel steeple plays Protestant hymns.

You must experience how happy we hicks are here in our rural way of life.

Most Americans and British have yet to wake up to the fact that the events of 9/11 were staged by elements of western governments, militaries and business communities; what we usually call the "military-industrial complex" and "the secret state."

The real agenda, is so shocking that I’m not sure many people could or would believe it. It was to start a World War, in the event that the regional wars did not cement the control of that group, in which all but 500 million of the Earth’s population of 7 billion would perish.

False-flags go back further than Biblical times: dressing soldiers in the uniforms of other armies and staging attacks was used by the Japanese to start their war against China.

Blowing up your own ships was used in the destruction of the USS Maine and in the Tonkin Gulf, the attempted destruction of the USS Liberty, the USS Cole, and many other instances.

The attacks on the Murrah Building in Oklahoma, the Madrid train bombing, the London bombings, and the Mumbai assault all were staged in the same false-flag way that 9/11 was.

In many of these attacks, though not all of them, the blame was laid at the doorstep of "Muslim terrorists."

Bin Laden was not responsible for 9/11. On the eve of 9/11, as Dan Rather reported at the time on the CBS News, he was lying in a Rawalpindi hospital, guarded by the Pakistani military and having kidney dialysis. In July of 2001, he was visited by the local CIA chief while in a Dubai hospital, even though he was wanted at the time for embassy bombings?

Bin Laden (or Tim Osman, to use his CIA alias) had nothing to do with 9/11 whatsoever, aside from allowing his name to be used as an undercover CIA agent, for which he received financial rewards. He was gone in the kidneys, suffered numerous ailments and probably died in December 2001.

The discriminatory actions taken against Muslims - the refusal to allow them to build religious centres, the suspicion levelled at them, and all other actions traceable to their being held responsible for 9/11 – all have no basis in fact.

What Cranmer really ought to be doing is apologizing to Islam for the false charges levelled against them for so many years and the suspicion and mistreatment that have arisen from his mistaken attitudes and his misunderstanding of events.

And apologize for his to rise above any such events (even if they were true) that continue to be laid at the doorstep of Muslims and blind us to our being brothers and sisters.

Governments, who’ve made apologies to Japanese-Americans, Canadians, Australian aborigines, and many others, should now to extend those apologies to Islam for the unjustified and unjustifiable misery and suffering caused them in recent years.

The corollary of what I’ve just said is that that there is no justification for the manner in which we’ve treated Muslim populations in our various countries and Islam in general.

Such attacks as the recent anti-Muslim film are designed to stir up hatred against Muslims for events as 9/11 and inflame Muslims to respond with violence in countries where they form the majority, further damaging them in the eyes of the non-Muslim world.

It’s time to apologize to Islam who have been wrongfully blamed for blatant false flag operations and to turn our backs on a sordid and shameful period in our history.

About His Grace:

Archbishop Cranmer takes as his inspiration the words of Sir Humphrey Appleby: ‘It’s interesting,’ he observes, ‘that nowadays politicians want to talk about moral issues, and bishops want to talk politics.’ It is the fusion of the two in public life, and the necessity for a wider understanding of their complex symbiosis, which leads His Grace to write on these very sensitive issues.

Cranmer's Law:

"It hath been found by experience that no matter how decent, intelligent or thoughtful the reasoning of a conservative may be, as an argument with a liberal is advanced, the probability of being accused of ‘bigotry’, ‘hatred’ or ‘intolerance’ approaches 1 (100%).”

Follow His Grace on

The cost of His Grace's conviction:

His Grace's bottom line:

Freedom of speech must be tolerated, and everyone living in the United Kingdom must accept that they may be insulted about their own beliefs, or indeed be offended, and that is something which they must simply endure, not least because some suffer fates far worse. Comments on articles are therefore unmoderated, but do not necessarily reflect the views of Cranmer. Comments that are off-topic, gratuitously offensive, libelous, or otherwise irritating, may be summarily deleted. However, the fact that particular comments remain on any thread does not constitute their endorsement by Cranmer; it may simply be that he considers them to be intelligent and erudite contributions to religio-political discourse...or not.

The Anglican Communion has no peculiar thought, practice, creed or confession of its own. It has only the Catholic Faith of the ancient Catholic Church, as preserved in the Catholic Creeds and maintained in the Catholic and Apostolic constitution of Christ's Church from the beginning.Dr Geoffrey Fisher, Archbishop of Canterbury, 1945-1961

British Conservatism's greatest:

The epithet of 'great' can be applied only to those who were defining leaders who successfully articulated and embodied the Conservatism of their age. They combined in their personal styles, priorities and policies, as Edmund Burke would say, 'a disposition to preserve' with an 'ability to improve'.

I am in politics because of the conflict between good and evil, and I believe that in the end good will triumph.Margaret Thatcher, Baroness Thatcher LG, OM, PC, FRS.(Prime Minister 1979-1990)

We have not overthrown the divine right of kings to fall down for the divine right of experts.Harold Macmillan, 1st Earl of Stockton, OM, PC.(Prime Minister 1957-1963)

Socialism is a philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the gospel of envy, its inherent virtue is the equal sharing of misery.Sir Winston Churchill, KG, OM, CH, TD, FRS, PC (Can).(Prime Minister 1940-1945, 1951-1955)

I am not struck so much by the diversity of testimony as by the many-sidedness of truth.Stanley Baldwin, 1st Earl Baldwin of Bewdley, KG, PC.(Prime Minister 1923-1924, 1924-1929, 1935-1937)

If you believe the doctors, nothing is wholesome; if you believe the theologians, nothing is innocent; if you believe the military, nothing is safe.Robert Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury, KG, GCVO, PC.(Prime Minister 1885-1886, 1886-1892, 1895-1902)

I am a Conservative to preserve all that is good in our constitution, a Radical to remove all that is bad. I seek to preserve property and to respect order, and I equally decry the appeal to the passions of the many or the prejudices of the few.Benjamin Disraeli KG, PC, FRS, Earl of Beaconsfield.(Prime Minister 1868, 1874-1880)

Public opinion is a compound of folly, weakness, prejudice, wrong feeling, right feeling, obstinacy, and newspaper paragraphs.Sir Robert Peel, Bt.(Prime Minister 1834-1835, 1841-1846)

I consider the right of election as a public trust, granted not for the benefit of the individual, but for the public good.Robert Jenkinson, 2nd Earl of Liverpool.(Prime Minister 1812-1827)

Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves.The Rt Hon. William Pitt, the Younger.(Prime Minister 1783-1801, 1804-1806)